Get Started for FREE
Sign up with Facebook Sign up with X
I don't have a Facebook or a X account
 Your new post is loading...
Your new post is loading...
Scoop.it!
Quotes from Sylvia Plath, George Orwell, Zadie Smith, Roald Dahl, Junot Diaz, Harper Lee and others on 'Why I Write'. “I want to write because I have the urge to excel in one medium of translation and expression of life. I can’t be satisfied with the colossal job of merely living. Oh, no, I must order life in sonnets and sestinas and provide a verbal reflector for my 60-watt lighted head.” – Sylvia Plath 
No comment yet.
Sign up to comment
Scoop.it!
From
hi
There aren’t as many mountains visible from the city of Reykjavik as there are in Missoula, but they’re waiting, when you want them. Head out to the docks and look out at the horizon. On a clear day, you can see them lining the sky. On a cloudy or foggy day, only the sharpest of the bunch stand out against the otherwise ocean-dominated curve of the planet. And they’re more than enough.
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Creative with your coffee... Well said!
Scoop.it!
Once upon the time--1969, to be exact--The Valley of Gwangi (see poster, left) was made. Based on a story concept by stop-motion pioneer Willis O'Brien (King Kong), and employing the stop-motion effects of Ray Harryhausen (former apprentice to O'Brien), it was and is the greatest cowboy-dinosaur movie ever made. In the summer of 1970, a pencil-necked geek named Matt (see photo, right) discovered Gwangi quite by accident when it was the opening "B-movie" at his local theater with When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth. Matt was all of seven, and he hooted and hollered and cheered throughout the film. He was all alone that evening ... well, sort of all alone....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Fabulous storytelling and story craft by @storytellerMatt. Highly recommended. 9 / 10
Scoop.it!
A Breadcrumb Trail of Recent US Writing and Publishing Stats:
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Who knew? :-)
Scoop.it!
When it comes to great magazine writing, what’s in a name? I have had it with long-form journalism. By which I mean—don’t get me wrong—I’m fed up with the term long-form itself, a label that the people who create and sell magazines now invariably, and rather solemnly, apply to their most ambitious work. Reader, do you feel enticed to plunge into a story by the distinction that it is long? Or does your heart sink just a little? Would you feel drawn to a movie or a book simply because it is long? (“Oooh—you should really read Moby-Dick—it’s super long.”) Journalists presumably care about words as much as anyone, so it is mysterious that they would choose to promote their stories by ballyhooing one of their less inherently appealing attributes. Do we call certain desserts “solid-fat-form food” or do we call them cakes and pies? Is baseball a long-form sport? Okay, sure—but would Major League Baseball ever promote it as that? So why make a ripping yarn or an eye-popping profile sound like something you have to file to the IRS?.
Jeff Domansky's insight:
James Bennet wrestles with the term long -form to come up with a better description.
Scoop.it!
What's that? Your job leaves you with scarcely enough time or energy to cook occasional healthy meals, let alone lose yourself in a great book? We're sure you're busy, but we're incredulous, especially considering your fervent opinions on "The Mindy Project." We needn't remind you of the multitudinous benefits of reading - some of them obvious, some of them surprising - but we will anyway: Books can make you more empathetic. They can keep your brain sharp, and even stave off Alzheimer's disease. Still not ready to hop on the Infinite Jest bandwagon? Fair enough. But we urge you to start somewhere. According to Forbes, the average reading speed for an American adult is 300 words per minute. So we did a little math, and found 12 short stories that, for the average American adult, should take less than 10 minutes each to read. Check a few out on your lunch break! Who knows, you may discover something you like...
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Sometimes you stumble across a post that's perfect. This is one of them. I can't wait to read these classic short stories. Recommended reading. 10/10
Scoop.it!
Since launching in private beta last year, Medium has been building up its platform, which aims to offer a simple but 'beautiful' reading and writing experienceIt was one year ago this week when the online publishing world was abuzz with the news that two of Twitter's founders had launched a new platform called Medium, in private beta.In the early days only a select group of people were allowed behind the scenes to contribute content to Medium. Some details on the platform were made public via an announcement post from Ev Williams, in which he described Medium as "a new place on the Internet where people share ideas and stories that are longer than 140 characters and not just for friends".In the past year the group of people invited to write has grown, and we are told it "should be a short wait from now" when the platform will be available for all to use. The main aim of Medium is to be "the best place to read and write about things that matter", and this emphasis on both the writing and reading experience has been reflected in its approach over the past 12 months....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Medium grows larger in influence. Medium continues to impress with the quality of its design and, most important, the quality of its writing. It's a great resource for those hungry for quality ideas, well written. Wonder what will happen when it goes public and they try to monetize it? I hope they keep makes it work beautifully now.
Scoop.it!
The headline will greatly influence your website traffic, bounce rates, conversions and trust. Millions of new blog posts, billions of new emails and thousands of hours of videos are uploaded online each day.... When each of your readers is following hundreds, or thousands, of other twitter accounts, you need your tweets to stand out and get their attention in the split second it takes to read a headline. This is why headlines are so important. This is what will draw your readers in to actually see what you have written. If your headline isn’t compelling enough, it won’t matter what your article has to say. No one will ever see it....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Bloggers, writers and PR pros will benefit from these tips on writing great headlines.
Scoop.it!
It’s one of my favorite pieces of writing advice from Ray Bradbury, and it’s blindingly brilliant in its utter simplicity. If you want to identify the ideas you should write about, the themes you can write passionately and believably about, follow this advice: Make a list of ten things you love, ten things you hate, and ten things you fear. Write to celebrate the things you love, and write to destroy the things you hate and fear.
Bradbury put it this way in an interview with his biographer, Sam Weller: “You can’t write for other people. You can’t write for the left or the right, this religion or that religion, or this belief or that belief. You have to write the way you see things.
I tell people, Make a list of ten things you hate and tear them down in a short story or poem. Make a list of ten things you love and celebrate them. When I wrote Fahrenheit 451 I hated book burners and I loved libraries. So there you are.”...
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Great advice and inspiration from a masterful storyteller - Ray Bradbury.
Scoop.it!
"A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper."
(photo of Joan Didion)
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Inspiration from writers who inspire us with their craft including Bradbury, Didion, Hemingway, Miller, Kerouac, Franklin, Angelou and more. Many thanks to Maria Popova for sharing.
Scoop.it!
Curating eclectic interestingness from culture's collective brain...
Sigmund Freud — key figure in the making of consumer culture, deft architect of his own myth, modern plaything — spent a fair amount of his career exploring the psychology of dreams. In 1908, he turned to the intersection of fantasies and creativity, and penned a short essay titled “Creative Writers and Day-Dreaming,” eventually republished in the anthology The Freud Reader (public library). Though his theories have been the subject of much controversy and subsequent revision, they remain a fascinating formative framework for much of the modern understanding of the psyche.
Predictably, Freud begins by tracing the subject matter to its roots in childhood, stressing, as Anaïs Nin eloquently did — herself trained in psychoanalysis — the importance of emotional investment in creative writing...
|
Scoop.it!
On this day ...in 1948, Lowell native Jack Kerouac happily noted in his diary that he had written 2500 words. If he could keep up this pace, he would finish his first novel in a matter of weeks. The highly autobiographical The Town and the City was published in 1950, the same year he began writing On the Road, the novel that earned him the title "Father of the Beat Generation." By the time he died at the age of 47 Jack Kerouac had published 14 books. On the Road is Kerouac's most-read work today; it is widely considered one of the most important and influential American novels of the twentieth century, and Jack Kerouac is celebrated as one of Lowell's favorite sons....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Remembering one of my favorite novels...
Scoop.it!
These funny, crass, and addictive sites are must-reads for any 20-something who cares about books. The new literary generation is here, and it's bored — bored with the New Yorker, bored with the New York Times, bored with the New York Review of Books.We need new literary sustenance. We want writing by people who understand the tremendous attentional effort it requires to read more than three sentences of anything. We want a literary La La Land that gives us gifs and James Joyce in the same breath. Screw it — we want gifs of James Joyce. While I look for those, take a look at these: The best — funniest, crassest, headiest, least boring, most addictive — literary blogs for 20-something readers and writers....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Forget the self-absorbed, 20-something crap. These literary mags are for anyone with a pulse and the ability to still remember what it was like to be 20 years old.
Insta*Grads's curator insight,
January 7, 2014 4:57 AM
A reading list for Millennials after graduation. 
Paulo Abilio Varella Lisboa's curator insight,
January 16, 2014 8:14 AM
Boa indicação de blogs de literatura que vale a pena conferir!
Scoop.it!
Ponder good luck and ill fortune for 2014 with authors Matt Bell, Julianna Baggott, Jacinda Townsend and more...The New Year is a time to think about luck, magic and omens, so Salon asked a few authors for two-sentence stories (originally inspired by these, on Reddit), about a blessing, a curse or both. Read what they came up with, and be careful what you wish for...
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Very creative and quick, enjoyable reading.
Scoop.it!
When we asked you to nominate your favorite writing blog as one of the top 10 blogs for writers, we got over 1,100 nominations! Wonderful to see how passionate readers are about their favorite writing blog. It’s great to see some very interesting new blogs amongst the winners! Of note is that quite a few blogs in the top 10 are associated with author platforms. Make sure you visit all the top 10 blogs to get to know the new crop of top writing blogs....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Check out the top 10 blogs for writers 2013 in the 8th annual contest run by WritetoDone.com. . Great resource!.
Scoop.it!
Three unpublished stories by the famously reclusive American writer, J.D. Salinger, have leaked online after appearing on an eBay auction.The auction, which ended Sep. 23, 2013, advertised a book containing three stories, titled "Untitled or Paula," "Birthday Boy," and "The Ocean Full of Bowling Balls". The first two stories are dated 1941 and 1946, respectively, while the third one doesn't have a date....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
A Perfect Day for Bananafish and JD Salinger fans.
Scoop.it!
One Year Later, Medium Is Changing the Way Its Writers Write and Its Readers Read | Mediashift | PBS
It was just more than a year ago that Ev Williams and Biz Stone created the publishing platform Medium.... At the heart of Medium is a sense of connectedness between those who create words and those who consume them, and the site’s future looks promising to technology experts like Warren.“ As a platform, I envision Medium becoming a curated magazine of sorts that lives digitally,” she wrote via email. “I think with a strong tablet app that is able to curate Medium’s content flipboard-style, the platform could actually also be a publication in its own right.” For now, the site continues to guide readers through a consumptive experience unlike any other — and meanwhile, the writers are responsible for building up Medium’s content and shaping the site, post by post. “We want to optimize for great interactions between writers and readers,” Davies wrote via email....
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Medium continues to get large as readers and pageviews grow at the longform website.
Scoop.it!
The author of horror classics like The Shining and its 2013 sequel Doctor Sleep says the best writers hook their readers with voice, not just action.... Stephen King: There are all sorts of theories and ideas about what constitutes a good opening line. It's tricky thing, and tough to talk about because I don't think conceptually while I work on a first draft -- I just write. To get scientific about it is a little like trying to catch moonbeams in a jar. But there's one thing I'm sure about. An opening line should invite the reader to begin the story. It should say: Listen. Come in here. You want to know about this. How can a writer extend an appealing invitation -- one that's difficult, even, to refuse?We've all heard the advice writing teachers give: Open a book in the middle of a dramatic or compelling situation, because right away you engage the reader's interest. This is what we call a "hook," and it's true, to a point. This sentence from James M. Cain's The Postman Always Rings Twice certainly plunges you into a specific time and place, just as something is happening: "They threw me off the hay truck about noon."...
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Advice from the master of horror for storytellers, bloggers and writers. This entire By Heart is a series in The Atlantic in which authors share and discuss their all-time favorite passages in literature. It is recommended reading.
Scoop.it!
Hold the front page used to have a interesting, and updated daily, section called 'story ideas.' The idea was simple - you have slow news days, and these were ideas to see you through....A rainy day in Bury, obviously, isn’t news. However, hopefully these 10 websites could be of use. Yes, some of them are obvious, but I thought I’d list them all the same.
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Writer's block? Bloggers and writers take note...
Scoop.it!
From
medium
I’m working on the followup to Steal Like An Artist, my book about how to be more creative in the digital age. It’s been a real pain in the ass. Here are five things that have helped: 1. Shut up and write the book.
Jeff Domansky's insight:
Such a great reminder. Shut up and write the book... post, article, letter, email...
Scoop.it!
The more talkative half of the famed magic duo says that even for professionals, this magic act is a tough act to swallow...
I didn’t learn fire-eating to conquer my fears. I learned fire-eating because I desperately wanted to be in show business. You don’t want to learn fire-eating from a book, but that’s how I started. I read Step Right Up! by Dan Mannix—the 1950 memoir of a real-life carny—and I wanted to be “with it.” Dan didn’t explain how to eat fire, but I felt I could read between the lines and figure it out. I was 19 years old, and like many men that age, I felt invincible. I wasn’t, and you aren’t. Remember that. Do not eat fire!
I practiced all afternoon and burned the snot out of my mouth and lips. My mouth looked like wall-to-wall herpes sores, with cartoonish, giant teeth glued to my lips. There were so many blisters I couldn’t press my lips together. I sure couldn’t have whistled. I thought I had to ignore the pain and I did. I’ve always been good at focus. My girlfriend arrived home and screamed in horror (19-year-old men often make 19-year-old women do that). We didn’t kiss for a week . . . and we were 19.
Don’t learn fire-eating from a magazine, but here’s how it works. Just, don’t do it!r...
[What can I say? Genius storytelling, writing ~ Jeff]
Scoop.it!
Malcolm Gladwell, Daniel H. Pink, David Sedaris and others search for highly-intelligent life in the universe.
The MacArthur Geniuses were announced this week, which got us wondering about genius. What is genius? Can it actually be measured? Is it even a real thing?
[This is genius writing, selected and shared by Byliner. If you've never tried Byliner, you're in for a treat. It's like having your own literary salon. Well worth the mostly-free subscription ~Jeff]
|
A little Friday writing inspiration.